Most of us believe that the foundation of a well-run meeting is a well-formed agenda. What makes a "well-formed" agenda? How can we write and manage agendas to make meetings successful?
eanna hated chairing meetings. She looked around the room. "So, have we dealt with that item? Is everyone OK?" Nobody replied. Most were looking down at their pads or their coffee mugs. Dave continued peeling the label from his water bottle.
Having waited long enough, Deanna continued, "I'll take that as a yes." But she thought to herself, 'This is so discouraging. Nobody cares.'
She might be right about that. And there's an alternative explanation, too. The agenda item she's asking about is simply, "Marigold." With such a vague and ambiguous statement of the agenda item, many on the team can't really tell whether they're free to express their concerns. Rather than risk being ruled out of order, some just sit quietly. Others are willing to move on because they just hate meetings.
Deanna and her team are suffering some of the consequences of stating agenda items ambiguously. How you express the agenda, and the order of the items, helps set expectations, which strongly influences the effectiveness of any meeting. Here are some tips for making effective agendas.
Phrase each agenda item as an imperative
For instance, not "Marigold" but "Resolve issues in Marigold." This sets a mental framework for attendees to actually do something.
Make agenda items specific
Phrasing each agenda item as an imperative sets a mental framework for action
Not "Resolve issues in Marigold", but rather "Resolve staffing issues in Marigold." Make agenda items describe a goal that's objectively measurable.
Allocate time to each agenda item
If you don't allocate time, you won't be able to tell whether the meeting is running late or by how much.
Deal with overruns honestly
If an item takes longer than planned, don't steal time from other items. Halt discussion, and decide which later agenda item(s) you'll postpone or shift to committee.
Have a timekeeper
The facilitator has enough work to do, especially if the facilitator is also chair.
Exploit order
If one item is likely to smoke out information that will help other items — or render them moot — do it first.
Address emotionally charged items early
Charged items require energy, and they're also dangerous. Address them while everyone is fresh. Leaving them for the end as a way of managing time doesn't actually work. The tension will only build if you leave them for the end.
Poll everyone for contributions in advance
You don't want people bringing up new and possibly irrelevant or unaddressable items right at the start of the meeting. When you poll attendees for agenda items before you distribute your draft agenda, you find out where the energy is, and it's a big win to pick up important items you hadn't thought of. Move to the "Not-Agenda" any items you don't want to address or can't address.
Ironically, we tend to pay more attention to agendas for larger meetings. Smaller meetings actually require more care, because of the temptation to slip into informal conversation. I could go on about that, but it isn't on today's agenda. TopNext Issue
Do you spend your days scurrying from meeting to meeting? Do you ever wonder if all these meetings are really necessary? (They aren't) Or whether there isn't some better way to get this work done? (There is) Read 101 Tips for Effective Meetings to learn how to make meetings much more productive and less stressful — and a lot more rare. Order Now!
Like a traditional family album, a project family album has pictures of people, places and events. It builds connections, helps tie the team together, and it can be as much fun to look through as it is to create.
High-performance teams have customary ways of working together that suit them, their organization and their work. But when emergencies happen, operating in business-as-usual mode damages teams — and the relationships between their people — permanently. To avoid this, train for emergencies.
When your current approach isn't working, you can scrap whatever you're doing and start again — if you have enough time and money. There's a less radical solution, and if it works, it's usually both cheaper and faster.
One often-neglected project risk is the risk of inaccurately reported status. That shouldn't be surprising, because we often fail to report the status of the project's risks, as well. What can we do to better manage status risk and risk status?
I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates.
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Organizational Politics for People Who Hate Politics
Have you ever felt powerless to implement an important new idea? Have you ever been "blind-sided" at a meeting? Have you ever lost two good employees because you could find no way to keep them from attacking each other? These are some of the issues of organizational politics. Many of us have become enmeshed in them from time to time, but we've also known some people who seem to be able to engage and prosper. How is that done? We'll inventory the challenges of organizational politics, and provide tools for anticipating and addressing them. The focus of this program is practical — attendees learn concrete techniques for dealing with the problems that arise in workplace politics, while keeping their integrity intact. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:
Adopting agile approaches to software development carries risk. If you've discovered some of the problems for yourself, or if you've heard horror stories from others, you know some of the risks. This session explores the nature of the risks of agile adoption. We'll explore the top three risk factors that tangle agile initiatives, and examine relevant mitigation strategies. Most organizations err by starting with training. A more constructive approach with faster return on investment is organic agile capability development. We'll discuss how you can grow organizational agile capability organically by balancing training, coaching and restructuring. Faulty or misleading agile capability indicators are a second pitfall. Although there is no standard measure of agility yet, we'll show you how to focus on what matters to your business to achieve the full promise of agile methods. Finally, we'll explore the importance of measurement methodology and how you set up expectations around budget and schedule targets. By looking at what has gone wrong in agile adoption initiatives, we'll help you prevent the foreseeable problems, and mitigate the risks of the unforeseeable ones. With Nancy Van Schooenderwoert. Here's an upcoming date for this program:
Most of us can assess technological risks, but risks related to human behavior tend to resist our best efforts. This session provides a framework for evaluating risks related to the behavior of individuals, teams, organizations and people generally. Human-centered risk differs from technological or market risk, because objective evaluation requires acknowledging personal and organizational limitations and failures. Since some of those limitations and failures might apply to the people assessing the risks, or to their superiors, there's a tendency to deny them or to explain them away. Our approach examines capability, organization, context, risk mitigation, and workplace politics. It has tools for guiding the assessment and management of human-centered risk, and we show how to extend these tools to suit your situation. You'll learn how to identify sources of risk in human behavior; recognize systemic and individual barriers to acknowledging risk; assess the effects of organizational turbulence; determine the risk associated with inappropriate internal risk transfer; estimate the effects of team dysfunction, toxic conflict and turnover; and measure the impact of workplace politics. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:
Managing global or dispersed teams is challenging — miscommunications, misunderstandings, and interpersonal conflict all thrive in the typical environment of the distributed team. And they're even more common in global teams, because of time-zone offsets and language and cultural differences. We'll inventory the challenges distributed and global teams face, and provide tools for anticipating and addressing them. The focus of this program is practical — attendees will learn concrete techniques for preventing and dealing with the problems that accompany global and distributed teams. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:
What do you do when your team can't make critical decisions? Or worse, when they make a decision, what do you do when they open it up again next week? Making good decisions and facilitating group decisions are both critical skills for project managers. In this revealing and interactive program, I demonstrate a model of decision-making that captures the internal conflicts we all feel when we make difficult decisions. With a better understanding of how we resolve conflicting priorities, we not only become more skilled at making decisions, but we learn how to make decisions that "stick." Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:
The Politics of Meetings for People Who Hate Politics
There's a lot more to running an effective meeting than having the right room, the right equipment, and the right people. With meetings, the whole really is more than the sum of its parts. How the parts interact with each other and with external elements is as important as the parts themselves. And those interactions are the essence of politics for meetings. This program explores techniques for leading meetings that are based on understanding political interactions, and using that knowledge effectively to meet organizational goals. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:
Person-to-Person Communication for Project Managers
When we talk, listen, send or read emails, read or write memos, or when we leave or listen to voice mail messages, we're communicating person-to-person. And whenever we communicate person-to-person, we risk being misunderstood, offending others, feeling hurt, and being confused. There are so many ways for things to go wrong that we could never learn how to fix all the problems. A more effective approach avoids problems altogether, or at least minimizes their occurrence. In this very interactive program you'll learn a model of inter-personal communications that can help you stay out of the ditch. In those moments of intense involvement, when we're most likely to slip, you'll have a new tool to use to keep things constructive. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:
In October, increase awareness of workplace politics, and learn how to convert destructive politics to creative politics. Order the Workplace Politics Awareness Month Kit during October at the special price of USD 29.95 and save USD 10.00! Check it out!
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Are you fed up with tense, explosive meetings? Are you or a colleague targets of a bully? Read 101 Tips for Managing Conflict to learn how to make peace with conflict. Check it out!
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eanna hated chairing meetings. She looked around the room. "So, have we dealt with that item? Is everyone OK?" Nobody replied. Most were looking down at their pads or their coffee mugs. Dave continued peeling the label from his water bottle.
Having waited long enough, Deanna continued, "I'll take that as a yes." But she thought to herself, 'This is so discouraging. Nobody cares.'
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Next IssueDo you spend your days scurrying from meeting to meeting? Do you ever wonder if all these meetings are really necessary? (They aren't) Or whether there isn't some better way to get this work done? (There is) Read 101 Tips for Effective Meetings to learn how to make meetings much more productive and less stressful — and a lot more rare. Order Now!
Make a Project Family Album
Declaring Condition Red
Team Thrills
Bois Sec!
Status Risk and Risk Status
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In October, increase awareness of workplace politics, and learn how to convert destructive politics to creative politics. Order the Workplace Politics Awareness Month Kit during October at the special price of USD 29.95 and save USD 10.00! Check it out!
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Are you doing work you love? Are you less in love with the job? Bad boss, long commute, troubling ethical questions, hateful colleague? Read Go For It! Sometimes It's Easier If You Run to learn what we can do when we love the work but not the job. It helps you get moving again!
Are you fed up with tense, explosive meetings? Are you or a colleague targets of a bully? Read 101 Tips for Managing Conflict to learn how to make peace with conflict. Check it out!
Are you managing a change effort that faces rampant cynicism, passive non-cooperation, or maybe even outright revolt? Read 101 Tips for Managing Change to learn how to plan and execute your change efforts to inspire real, passionate support. Check it out!
A Tip a Day arrives by email, or by Yahoo! Widget, each business day. It's 20 to 30 words at most, and gives you a new perspective on the hassles and rewards of work life. Most tips also contain links to related articles. Free!
Do you ever wonder if all these meetings are really necessary? (They aren't) Or whether there isn't some better way to get this work done? (There is) Read 101 Tips for Effective Meetings to learn how to make meetings more productive — and more rare. Check it out!
